For men there was no promise of life, but only new preparations for
death, and continued killing.
The battle of Verdun was still going on, and France had saved herself
from a mortal blow at the heart by a desperate, heroic resistance
which cost her five hundred and fifty thousand in dead and wounded. On
the British front there were still no great battles, but those trench
raids, artillery duels, mine fighting, and small massacres which
filled the casualty clearing stations with the average amount of human
wreckage. The British armies were
being held in leash for a great offensive in the summer. New divisions
were learning the lessons of the old divisions, and here and there
generals were doing a little fancy work to keep things merry and
bright.
So it was when some mines were exploded under the German earthworks on
the lower slopes of the Vimy Ridge, where the enemy had already blown
several mines and taken possession of their craters. It was to gain
those craters, and new ones to be made by our mine charges, that the
74th Brigade of the 25th Division, a body of Lancashire men, the 9th
Loyal North Lancashires and the 11th Royal Fusiliers, with a company
of Royal Engineers and some Welsh pioneers, were detailed for the
perilous adventure of driving in the mine shafts, putting tremendous
charges of high explosives in the sapheads, and rushing the German
positions.
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